When a printer reports an ink cartridge needs replacing as it is “empty” I wondered how much ink there was actually left in the cartridge.
The answer is surprising – quite a lot. Certainly enough to use in some artistic endeavour.
Fill a few jam jars with water, drop some ink cartridges in and wait for 24 hours. The result is some beautiful, vivid water-based inks to use.
That was the easy bit. The next stage needs a bit more imagination :o)
Finding Something from Nothing 
Brilliant idea. Problem that my colour cartridge is all in one but perhaps I can tape over each colour in turn… Messy play will follow!
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what a clever, clever artist you are!! 🙂 plus, that bottom image is quite lovely isn’t it!? thank you for sharing that idea with us
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I will remember that and may get around to trying it out.
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Cool idea! I saw a youtube where the artist used heat to seal the ink afterwards. But the steps towards freeing the ink was rather complicated. Maybe that was another type of ink? Or laser? Anyway, I’ll might try your idea! 😄
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That’s interesting – Laser coloured toner would need heating up to fix it. I had never thought of using old laser cartridges. I think I will try to find some old cartridges and see if I can get the toner out of them. Who knows what the result will be!
Thanks for the idea 🙂
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clever idea! the cartridges in the pic are quite small. mine are huge. do I just need to use a much bigger container of water, or is it just logistically impossible? 😀
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The cartridges I was using are for inkjet printers. Not sure I’ve seen cartridges too much bigger. If they are bigger they may be laser printer toner cartridges so the water trick wouldn’t work. But I will try and experiment getting coloured toner out of old laser cartridges and see if I do something.
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yes, it’s a laser printer. now I remember you talked about that in your post. doh! lol. it looked so cool. I’ll keep an eye on your blog to see how your laser cartridge experiment goes! 😁
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I LOVE this idea. It is upcycling at it’s best. We all have printers and now you have given us a creative way to take the basic primary colours and experiment. I will wear one of my boyfriends old shirts when I try this (his shirts reach almost to my knees.
Waste not want not as my grandmother used to say.
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Love your recycling efforts and playful, beautiful work.
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that is so cool…
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You know, I’ve thought about this, but had no idea how to release the ink. Thank you! I’m going to give it a try!
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